An iphone will probably rank up there with the phone Surur posted; I think sonyericsson has the best design/plan for musicphones. They've really nailed it as best as can be done given the drm/carrier restrictions that abound right now.
Having said that, i think that an iphone is probably going to be along these lines, probably with a very apple-fied UI. I think over time Apple might try something more smartphoney, but it's not the first thing they'll do. And in that regard, they'll probably make a shiney, ipod-ish phone, and SE and Apple will split the musicphone market.

What is Apple going to bring to the party? What feature set do you see as new and intriguing? (Not to bring up the past -- but they did not stick with the Newton long enough -- is this redemption time?)

Cheers, Perry.

Apple stuff has incredible style. I am very sorry Jobs killed the Newton; otherwise 90% of us with treos would have much more advanced newton phones instead today...

I so wish Sony haven't moved to the stupid M2 memory card. Hopefully the iPhone will have some memory build in.

BTW I was in Hong Kong yesterday. Nobody uses the big iPod, I mean NOBODY. You may be able to find the new iPod nano but the market is over ran by Sony and Nokia music phones. I almost brought an egg-shaped tiny mp3 player for my friend.

I don't think the iPhone will be a smartphone. I know alot of people will be disappointed but let's see what happen.

Ditto that.

They're more likely to go after the consumer masses with a music phone to leverage their iTunes/iPod dominance.

Making a smartphone would mean either using someone else's OS (doubtful for Apple) or building their own, which requires creating an ecosystem of applications and developers. I don't think the market is big enough to support another platform...

Archie, it seems most of what you posted seemed to describe wireless synch? It's hard to see how apple is going to usurp that. I mean, apart from the 1-2% of desktop users in the "real world" who use a mac, how are they gonna get everyone to suddenly ditch MS Outlook and switch over to a 3rd party iCal compatible program?

Sure, it will have iTunes music access, and it had better include unlimited songs (not the stupid 100 limit currently on the motorolas), plus the ability to swap in/out SD cards. Either that, or at least 8GB of on-board flash memory. It will also need built in wifi, a screen at least the size of the zune or regular PDAs (not square like the treo). It will need some sort of replication of the iPod click wheel (to retain continuity for iPod users). It will also need a qwerty keyboard to optimize PDA functions, and a touch screen. Right now, I just don't see how apple is gonna pull all this off, in one device, without it being a brick.

My bet is that it will be a multimeida unlocked GSM phone. Syncs with iTunes etc. I will be surprised if they have agreements with all the different carriers worldwide. This way they can control the hardware like they do with everything else.

The point was NEW features. Everything you list is alrady being done, unless however you meant for those using Apple OS only.)

I specifically said:
"So say Apple releases a phone; it could have the ability to automatically have access to this data in a live manner. No syncing required. It is always just there and is always current"

If you read that, you might note that I specifically stated Apple would NOT use syncing functions as we know them today. Apple methodology will undoubtedly accomplish task with ease - in a manner that is NOT BEING DONE today.

Apple's phone type device would/could be a device that is truly mobile by being designed to tie in to Internet resources instead of only syncing to a Desktop PC/Mac that you don't get to very often. Don't see this in a Treo.

I go on to describe the capabilities a little further as applied to e-mail, contacts, calendars, events, and the to-do lists. Don't see this in a Treo.

The media management system in all of Apple's iPods allows for speech-to-text voice recognition selection of songs. I believe this was first used in conjunction with Acuras VoiceID system to operate the iPod by voice, but has since been used in a few other systems and you can even purchase software that converts going the other way as well, like iPod specific dictionaries and the Nike + iPod which all utilize Text-to-Speech capabilities. It seems quite plausible that this could certainly be utilized as an input method on a phone type of device coming from Apple. Don't see this in a Treo.

I also describe the new ways you could incorporate and use iTunes music this Apple phone of sorts. This would of course promote the further purchasing of content through the iTunes Store in addition to providing differentiation. Don't see this in a Treo.

Apple would also probably integrate seamless roaming and handover between local area networks and the wide area networks like phone services. This capability may be included as an additional feature to give users flexibility but also to ensure that larger market segments would be enticed based on limited provider coverage. Don't see this in a Treo.

I talk about it being able to interface with an iPod. Don't see this in a Treo.

I also mention this Apple device could see widget like capabilities. I base that assumption on their partnership with Nokia to supply their series 60 phones with Apple's WebCore and JavaScriptCore software to power their phone's web browsers. Don't see this in a Treo.

And then I mentioned Apple possibly incorporating a motion detection system to use as an interface element. The kind of motion detection you find in products like iPods to protect the hard drives, or MacBooks to act as a safety device and input method, or the Nike + iPod kit to measure cadence, running speed, workout stuff. This same type of sensor could be used in an Apple phone to quickly shut off the phone's ringer by simple grasping/squeezing it. Don't see this in a Treo.

Admittedly, these were just a few possible directions I arrived at in simply taking a step back to look at their current business direction and their capabilities; BUT, what more do you want.

I know Apple always makes pretty devices and they work too. But a iPhone? I didn't want one when they made it with Motorola and I am jsut not seeing the the Y factor in the iphone.
Contacts
phone
music
movies
calander......
Just buy a Nokia
I don't know. Maybe I just need to see it.

Being written on a Treo forum, I am assuming you bring this up because you would want bluetooth headphones on your iPod?

My answer to that is two-fold: 1.) utilizing cordless earphones would take away from the iPods identity and its popularity/recognizability, 2.) this identity is what gives the iPod its social factor (community-belonging) aspect; something Microsoft is desperately trying to grasp for with its half-g$$ attempt at utilizing wi-fi with the tagline of "welcome to the social".

Still, there are Bluetooth listening options available from third parties should one so choose to partake.

However; now that the iPod is as mature as it is, incorporating Bluetooth would seem to be in the future BUT, not so sure they will provide bluetooth headsets out of the box (this I personally doubt, but it could happen).

One other comment I would like to add in accordance to your tongue-in-cheek comment. The iPod is not a Treo and the Treo ain't no iPod so I cannot grasp why having bluetooth in a Treo(however functionally irrelevant it may be) would necessitate its use in an iPod.

According to rumer Apple already contracted Foxxcon the iPod maker to make the iPhone. People should know that Ed should have a pretty good idea what the iPhone is like from his industry spy. The fact that he has the confidence to trash talk Apple to me basically backhanded cimfirm the iPhone is not a smartphone.

This is the same reason why Steve "predicted" in an interview that MS will make a music player themselves before the Zune was announced. Steve Jobs knew about it already.

However, Ed has to know that a new popular cell phone with some smartphone features could possibly sell more than even the 680. The phone that Surur posted is one example. It looks like a W850. The features include 3G, bluetooth 2.0, email, SMS, MMS, RSS feeds and web browser. Pretty cool for a fun phone!

P.S. I just received the W850's little cousin, I'm going to test the phone to see how good SE's smartphone features are on a fun phone.